


Walking

by eternalhiraeth



Category: Dragon Ball
Genre: F/M, Sibling Incest, Twincest
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-12
Updated: 2019-05-12
Packaged: 2020-03-01 10:43:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,669
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18798748
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eternalhiraeth/pseuds/eternalhiraeth
Summary: Lapis doesn't know when his life got so fucked up, but he's got a few theories.





	Walking

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Sneasel](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sneasel/gifts).
  * A translation of [Keep Walking](https://archiveofourown.org/works/7962217) by [eternalhiraeth](https://archiveofourown.org/users/eternalhiraeth/pseuds/eternalhiraeth). 



> Another translation of mine. Again, I'd probably do a much better job writing this now. Thanks to Sneasel for showing interest in them!

Floating in a never-ending tank of viscous liquid, Lapis wonders at what point his life got so fucked up.

 

1.

The storm is louder than Lazuli’s voice and that’s always made him anxious. Lapis will never admit it’s fear, not even to her twin, partly because she already knows, but also because he’s too proud.

So tonight, surrounded by the lighting that briefly lights up the room and the thunder that rumbles through the whole house, Lapis gets up and walks on the cold floor until he reaches his sister’s bed. She’s already made room for him, her body is pressed against the wall and her usually immaculate hair is strewn across the pillow.

Lapis lays down and tugs the blankets up to his chin, staring at the girl. He knows, in a way he could never explain to anyone, that she’s awake, aware of his presence and of the warmth that radiates from his tiny body. Just like he is always aware of her.

Lapis searches for her hand under the sheets and twines their pinkies when he finds it.

 

2.

It’s the night before the start of eighth grade and Lapis forgets to knock on their bedroom door, his mind still occupied with the basketball game he just won. They still share a room, because the only other option would have been the old cabin in the forest, and neither of them is willing to stoop that low.

The rules are simple: knock when the door is closed and give each other the privacy you both need. Lapis never really understood what his mother meant by that until tonight.

He doesn’t notice the door is closed until it’s too late. He’s halfway into the room and his sister is clutching her pajama shirt in one hand while her dressing one lays on the floor, neither of them covering her. The room is only illuminated by the moonlight that bleeds in through the window and casts a strange glow on the girl’s porcelain skin.

Neither says anything when Lazuli stares at him with darkness-blown pupils. She puts on her pajamas, combs her hair with her fingers and lays down on her bed without breaking eye contact.

Lapis tries to steady his breathing as he slams the door on his way out.

 

3.

She’s sitting on the cargo bed of their friend Takoma’s pickup truck, a cigarette between her lips and her knees drawn up to her chest, eyes bored and cynical.

The sun’s burning her hair and tanning the pale skin he knows she hates so much. Her dull gaze follows the path of the river nearby until she sees him coming and her pupils adjust to focus on him.

Lapis walks up to the pickup truck and sees Takoma laying by the river, arm thrown over his face in an attempt at blocking the setting sun.

Smirking, he takes the cigarette from his sister’s mouth and takes a puff. The smoke vanishes in a matter of seconds.

“Wanna go for a ride?” he asks.

“One step ahead of you,” she pulls the truck’s keys from her pocket and throws them at him. His sister never disappoints.

Wordlessly, they head for the front part and Lapis plops down on the driver’s seat, as he usually does. She leans against the opposite side, watching the sun disappear through the open window. Lapis hands her back the cigarette and she inhales one last time while he runs the engine. The noise wakes Takoma, who scrambles to his feet, still looking dazed. His face contorts in sheer disbelief that this is happening again and he dashes towards the car, too slow to stop them.

Just as the vehicle starts moving, Lazuli throws the still lit cigarette at him and waves, hair already swaying with the wind.

 

4.

They’re lying on the branches of the tallest tree. It’s early in the afternoon, but thanks to the leafy tops of the forest, the place is barely illuminated by a few rays of sunlight.

It’s nap time and what was left of their cigarette pack is gone, leaving them in that sleepy, bored state neither of them has ever learned how to handle.

The tree has already lost all of its fruit and the birds sound too far away, so their usual game that consists of knocking them to the ground can be ruled out. Lazuli’s eyelids feel heavy and they’re about to close when she hears her brother sitting up.

She glances at him out of the corner of her eye and recognizes his characteristically confident smirk.

“What’s on your mind?”

“One of those games I like so much.”

“Tell me.”

“Let’s find out who can skip through more trees in the least amount of time.”

“And what do I get when I win?”

“What do you want?”

Lazuli mulls it over for a second.

“Your jacket.”

“I knew you liked it.”

She rolls her eyes and stands up next to him in precarious equilibrium.

“And on the off chance that you win, what do you want?”

Lapis shrugs, but there’s something he’s not saying.

“I’ll pick later.”

They agree on which tree is the finish line: a weeping willow by the river.

“Ready! Set!” neither waits for the “go!”, having discarded it years ago.

They jump skillfully from branch to branch, scaring off a flock of birds hidden among the leaves and sending whole nests toppling to the ground. Lapis can feel the wind whipping his face as he jumps from here to there, avoiding obstacles. He can also hear the commotion his sister is creating a few steps ahead of him.

Until he can’t anymore.

He’s just a pine tree away from the finish line, but the girl is out of his sight and it makes him stop dead in his tracks, his heart pounding and his eyes searching desperately.

Finally, he sees her, dangling from one of the willow’s branches, hanging above the river’s current. The rocks a few meters beneath her look sharper than usual. Her pink nails claw desperately at the wood, but judging by the way she’s shaking he knows she’ll slip eventually.

Lapis curses under his breath and jumps on the willow. Lazuli sees him and her panicked expression is replaced by a relieved one.

“Took you long enough,” her voice sounds calm but too shrill.

He doesn’t want to put too much weight on the branch that’s supporting her, but he needs to get as close as possible to help her, so he stands at the base and stretches an arm towards her.

“How’s the view down there, sis?” he asks almost distractedly while he watches her grimace as she decides which hand she should grab him with.

“Stop messing around. You always liked playing pretend knight.”

“But only the kind that lets princesses die.”

When she manages to hold on to his arm, Lazuli sways to the side opposite to the river and lands on her knees against the grass. Lapis, feeling the branch tremble under him, jumps too and lands next to her, almost crushing her. Then he huffs.

“I think we can both agree that I won.”

She frowns at him but sighs.

“Fine. I guess you deserve it. What is it that you want?”

Lapis stares at the sky, struck by an idea.

“Remember that stupid story our mother used to read to us when we were little? The one where the knight saved the princess from the dragon?”

She nods, unsure of where he’s going with this. Lapis can’t help but think he should stop while he still can, but this is just another naughty game. It won’t mean anything, it’ll just satiate his curiosity.

“Well, remember how the princess rewarded the knight?”

Lazuli’s eyes go wide, showing emotion like they rarely do. She stares at him, laying on the wet grass. Lapis’ eyes, identical to her own, shine with mischief and maybe something else, something she doesn’t recognize because she’s never seen it before.

He’s her twin. He’s been with her their whole lives and he’s just gotten her out of trouble, just like she has done for him countless times. They love each other and right now, what he’s proposing sounds completely logical.

Lazuli shrugs with her usual indifference, but is hyper-aware of the boy leaning over her. She closes her eyes the moment she feels her brother’s warm mouth against hers.

They lay on the ground, listening to the water sliding over the rocks and enjoying what feels like a natural extension of the relationship they’ve always had; just another step to take down the path they’ve been walking since they were born.

They stay like that for a while, until Lapis’ arms get tired and he drops next to his sister. He feels for her hand and when he finds it, he twines their pinkies. Then he stands up and races her back home.

And for a while, they pretend it never happened.

 

5.

Neither of them liked Takoma very much, but his truck was always shiny and you could tell he was a couple years older, so he was the most auspicious candidate to be their adventure partner.

However, the looks he´s been throwing Lazuli’s way have long stopped being innocent, and even though it took her a while to notice, their casual flirting is now an almost daily occurrence. Lapis knows his sister is just playing, the same way they play when they vandalize private property or borrow motorbikes to go for rides. This doesn’t mean he likes Takoma one bit.

And he definitely does not like it when at the base of the mountain, less than a kilometer away from their home, he asks her out.

Lapis is just a few steps behind them, absentmindedly kicking any pebble that happens to be in his way, but Takoma’s question stops him in his tracks. He’s not facing them, but he can _feel_ the tyrannical grimace on his twin’s face and her sigh of superiority.

The rejection is cold, short and indifferent (much like Lazuli herself) and it twists the corners of Lapis’ mouth upwards. He turns to see the look on the other guy’s face and he doesn’t like it. His hands are balled into fists, his jaw is set and his head is thrown back in an attempt at looking more dignified. He huffs and opens his mouth to whisper a word under his breath:

“Bitch.”

Lazuli tries, she really does try to react first, but the outrage stalls her for a second and that’s enough to give Lapis an advantage. In the blink of an eye he’s on Takoma, flinging punches and kicks. But he seems to have forgotten about the size difference, which isn’t little, and Takoma quickly recovers from the surprise and starts defending himself.

Lazuli is hypnotized for a few moments, until she notices her twin getting more and more tired, while Takoma only grows angrier.

The last thing Lapis sees before falling unconscious is his sister’s irate eyes and Takoma’s nose being crushed by a pink-nailed hand.

 

6.

There’s a cabin connected to their house, deep in the forest, and that’s where Lazuli drags him to half an hour later, because their mother is gonna freak out when she finds out they’ve gotten into another fight. Once inside, she looks down at her outfit and sighs, realizing there’s no way to fix the mess of leaves and dirt on her top.

Save for the dirty clothes, they got out almost unharmed; he has a busted lip and a headache, while she’s missing half a fingernail.

The cabin is small, it only has a bed and a table, and a door that leads to a bathroom that floods every time somebody tries to shower in it.

Dismally aware of this, Lazuli stares at him with her indecipherable eyes and tells him she’s going to shower, disappearing behind the wooden door. Moments later Lapis hears the sound of her clothes and the water hitting the floor.

“Will you tell me why you did something so fucking stupid?” she asks from the bathroom.

“What?”

“Fighting someone a head taller than you.”

“... you heard him.”

There’s a silence as steam starts filtering through the ajar door.

“We have a deal, remember?” she answers. “Don’t get into trouble without the other. That prick almost kills you.”

“Please, I almost had him.”

“Sure you did, Lapis,” another pause. “I already took care of him anyway. I doubt he’ll be bothering us again.”

“Or lending us his truck.”

“As if that’s gonna stop us.”

Lapis can’t help the smirk that forms on his face.

“Now answer my question,” Lazuli says, so low he can barely hear her.

He keeps quiet.

Lazuli stops combing her soaking hair at his lack of an answer and opens her eyes, letting the water blur her sight.

Lapis is at the bathroom door’s threshold, staring straight into her eyes. His jacket and shirt have disappeared, and he’s doing that thing he always does with his hands when he’s nervous. She’s ever so slightly breathless, but her face doesn’t let it show.

Lazuli takes a step back to make room for him.

That night, when they don’t show up for dinner, neither of their parents think to look for them in the old cabin, where sounds die and actions have no consequences.

 

7.

They’ve been using the cabin for almost a year now, so it’d be really unfortunate if their father decided to check there a morning they forget to be back on time.

It’d be really unfortunate if he found them under the sheets, wearing nothing but pink nail polish.

It’d be really unfortunate if Lapis’s first reaction to his screaming and his horrified expression was to muster all the strength he has and push him backwards.

It’d be really unfortunate if the man didn’t open his eyes once he hit the ground.

It’d be really unfortunate if they had to throw on the first thing they could find and run deep into the forest.

It’d be really unfortunate if their mother, alerted by the noise, got to the cabin and had to connect the dots.

And it’d be really unfortunate if they had to live robbing stores and stealing cars, forever running from an invisible enemy.

It’d be truly unfortunate.

 

8.

The only thing roaming the road at this time of night is a freezing wind that bristles hair and freezes muscles.

“See? I told you this would be a waste of time. And of body heat, too,” Lazuli’s cynical tone contrasts against Lapis’ grin.

“Oh, take this and stop complaining,” he takes off his leather jacket and throws it at her with pretend annoyance.

The girl hesitates for a moment between giving it back or accepting it, but survival wins over pride and she puts it on.

Minutes later a small, slow car appears in the horizon and drags its way towards them. Lazuli takes a look at their next victim: he’s an outlandishly-dressed old man that regards her with the same curiosity she does him.

The old man stops the car and rolls down a window.

“Kids, do you need a ride?”

 _Weird, they’re not usually this compliant_ Lapis tells her with his eyes and she just shrugs, wanting to get this over with.

“We do, actually. Thank you so much,” Lazuli’s fake smile is charming and works the way it’s supposed to; the man opens a door.

“So where are your parents?” he asks once they’re both in the back seat.

“We don’t know.”

“We’re lost.”

The old man watches them in the rearview mirror, malice blatant in his eyes. Lapis is about to whisper to Lazuli that they should attack right now, but a jab into his neck turns everything black.

His sister’s scream will be the last human voice he hears for a very long time.

 

 

Floating in a never-ending tank of viscous liquid, Lapis realizes he’s been fucked since he was born.


End file.
